These cookies result from the encounter between my grandmother and Christine, an English lady who loved Italy and whom had traveled around the world, no one never really knew which her profession was, she would often write notes on a notepad.
She was a kind of regular at the Hotel and using her sloppy Italian she managed, quite uniquely, to get close to grandma Lina. She was always welcome and her favorite cookies were the rose water ones.
One day, upon returning from a long trip to Egypt, she brought Lina a present, a small bag, which smelled delicious, it contained the preparation for a very refreshing infusion she liked a lot and suggested Lina to use it in one of her recipes.
Lina started preparing straight away willing to make her friend's suggestion become a reality and to thank her as well for the present. The morning after Ms. Christine was very pleased with the outcome and she even managed to get the recipe (an absolute first).
Every time that in the following years Ms. Christine would stop at the Hotel, grandma would make sure to prepare her new favorite cookies, her son, my uncle Gianni, in fact was able to bring her the infusion prepara- tion from Siena, the town in which he studied.